LAW AND ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT “To The Boy In The Blue Knit Cap” Review

LAW AND ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT “To The Boy In The Blue Knit Cap” Season 10 Episode 8 (Series Finale) – So marks the end of a franchise. The only Law and Order to survive is the creepy one about perverts and children and women getting torturing and sexually abused and murdered. Occasionally there’s a man thrown into the mix, but really it’s all about the pervs so it hardly matters. Criminal Intent lasted an impressive ten years, faring far better than its Los Angeles little brother, but Vincent D’Onofrio’s star vehicle has come to an abrupt stop.

I say abrupt because while I realized that this was the final year for the series, I had no idea that the series would end on such a whimper. The only thing tying these eight episodes together was the weird therapy scenes with Goren, in which he talked about his anger issues and how they could potentially impede his job, yet they may have taken place on a different show entirely, for the Goren we saw investigating the crimes was not the Goren in the therapy scenes: there wasn’t even a hint of the Goren in the therapy scenes in the crime procedural.

Which makes me feel for Eames, not to mention Kathryn Erbes who was always shoved aside for D’Onofrio’s scene chewing. Erbes’ Eames became the writer’s audience surrogate: her job was less about policing, more about admiring Goren’s genius. She was the second fiddle on a one-man show which is only a pity because Erbes has often proven herself to be an underrated, understated, very good actress.

The case of the week was the usual Criminal Intent campy ridiculousness. Last week we had Icarus on Broadway parodying Julie Taymor’s Spiderman, this week we have James Van Der Beek and others take on The Social Network in a very very loose parody. There were blue hats and tears and computer codes and algorithms and father and son issues and fidelity problems galore and Goren and Eames sifted through the evidence and eventually found the killer. It was pretty boring, which is a pity because even though I wasn’t fond of it, last week’s Icarus and the episode about wine were not dull affairs at all.

Goren, ultimately, passed his psych therapy sessions and he and Eames rode off down the New York City streets to another crime scene. I found myself literally mouthing “Let’s go” as soon as I saw Eames standing on the sidewalk. I was wrong though. Law and Order: Criminal Intent isn’t so predictable after all. It turned out to be Goren who said, “Let’s go.”

What did you think of the series finale? Sound off in the comments below.

About The Author

Ciara is a television fanatic and has been since the early days of watching Donald Duck and Recess at ungodly hours on Saturday mornings.
A dual citizen of both the USA and Ireland she is perplexed by the lack of Irish-language television shows on primetime.
She loves all genres and enjoys reviewing both the good and the bad.

I am really saddened to see L&O CI come to an end. This might not have been an epic end but it was nevertheless a nice little wrap up that leaves the door open to the franchise coming back.

One can only hope.

Anonymous

Yes, ONE can only hope. I know: I have no heart.

Though, on a mildly unrelated note, I do have to say I’m really shocked and weirdly annoyed that NBC didn’t let the original Law and Order have one more season. Towards the end it really started to get a good cast gelling, but really I was hoping for one more season just so it could break Gunsmoke’s record for longest running drama. Ah well, maybe Law and Order: Sexual Abuse & Misery Porn will take up the mantle.

http://www.daemonstv.com/ Eric

I think SVU is going downhill as well since the main cast is bolting from it as well.

Anonymous

Well the good news from that is hopefully Mariska Hargitay can stop getting nominated for Best Actress Emmys!